Global Packaged Water Report 2015; Comprehensive Analysis of Trends in the Global Packaged Water Market Including Long-term Forecasts

Summary

Packaged water volumes just failed to overtake carbonates as the leading global beverage in 2014, with the category registering an increase of 7%. The main five countries in this category – China, USA, Germany, Italy and India – took a share of almost 50% of global volumes. Despite a slowdown in growth from the main China market, Asia increased its share of packaged water to almost 35%, while West Europe rebounded from its losses in 2013 to record annual growth of almost 2% in 2014. East Europe also witnessed a 2% expansion, mostly driven by increasing interest in healthy living in Turkey and Poland.

Key Findings

Emerging markets are continuing to make strong progress in the global packaged water category, with India, Indonesia, Nigeria and Turkey performing particularly well.

Strong economic growth and fierce competition between producers is helping to push volumes higher, while a lack of safe drinking water in these countries also drives consumers towards this category

Carbonated water has seen a rather mixed performance during the year. While volumes edged forwards on a global basis, the main European markets continued to suffer losses. West Europe, in particular, drove the decline, with German and Italian consumers shifting their preferences to low-carbonated products. However, growth for carbonated water in Asia and North America somewhat compensated for these losses, mostly thanks to China, Japan and the USA

PET continued as the dominant pack material in 2014, although environmental concerns have led some consumers to adopt light-weighting of PET in some markets. Eco-packaging is gaining increasing attention with thinner PET bottles benefitting from lower petroleum use in production and easier disposal